Cleaning Up
by xSn0wangel
Summary: When Natsu and Gray wreck Lucy's kitchen while she's on a mission they're in a race for time to get things clean. However it would help if they weren't giving each other the silent treatment. One-shot.


*WARNING* This story contains GrayxNatsu pairing or boyxboy pairing. If this offends you in any way please turn back now. Story rated T for slight vulgar language.

L7L7L7L7

Gray raked a hand through his messy hair as he tried to figure out the fastest way to clean the black soot covering the interior of Lucy's oven. There had to be an approach that he hadn't thought of that wouldn't involve scrubbing the sides on his hands and knees. Sighing from where he was squatting in front of the opened oven he realized that simply staring into it wasn't going to get him anywhere. In fact, sparing a glance at his phone he cursed. Lucy would be home in another twenty minutes!

Standing and moving over to the sink, he nudged Natsu aside long enough to prepare some soapy water in a bowl. Grabbing a rag that he hoped the celestrial mage wouldn't miss, he went back to the oven and began to rinse of the inside it's door. He winced at the temperature when he dipped the cloth down into the hot water and pulled his hand out of the bowl in surprise. Of course Natsu would be using the hottest water possible to clean Lucy's pans.

The pink haired boy had been attacking the burnt crusty mess with a plastic scraper for the last ten minutes but when Gray had gotten water, he'd seen how little progress the other had made. If Natsu would have let the pan soak in soapy water for ten minutes then the mess probably would have come right off. At least that's what Gray hypothesized. But the dragon slayer had instinctually picked up the scrapper and Gray didn't intervene.

Finishing up the door, Gray removed the wire racks from the stove and moved on to washing the sides of the interior. When a large clanging noise resounded through the kitchen his skull throbbed painfully. Natsu must have given up on the pan for the time being. Seeing the metal racks disappear from his periphery, he deduced that his friend had moved on to tackling those.

Seeing inside the oven was the hardest part. As much as he was squinting he could barely see the back of the damn thing. He'd looked around to see if Lucy's stove had some kind of light or something but it must have been busted because it wouldn't turn on. His hand holding the rag clutched it tightly as he fought against the anxiety working its way to the forefront of his mind.

This situation was so frustrating! Gray had so royally screwed things up last night that he wasn't even sure how to salvage any kind of friendship with Natsu. They had gotten so plastered at the guild that no one should have let them walk home alone which is probably why they didn't even end up at home. In their hazy brains they had decided it would be so much more fun to go visit Lucy and so they did or rather tried. After breaking in through her window and seeing her vacant apartment, Natsu had finally remembered that she had gone on a special mission with Erza and Levy.

Depressed but still drunk, Gray had the great idea for them to make brownies to which Natsu wholeheartedly agreed. When they'd thrown the ingredients together and shoved them into the oven they'd moved on to snooping through Lucy's personal items. They hit the jackpot when they found where she hid her novel. While Gray was theatrically reading it out loud, they had forgotten all about their brownies and it wasn't until Natsu smelled them burning that they rushed back to the kitchen.

When Gray pulled open the door to the stove, black smoke poured out and quickly filled the room. Natsu ate the flames licking the edges of the pan and the ice maker mage shoved the kitchen window open to help ventilate the room.

After the air had cleared when they looked at each other they laughed so hard that Natsu had to brace himself on the counter. Although they had both sobered up a bit from the whole experience, Gray's head was still pretty fuzzy as they kicked off their shoes and crawled into Lucy's bed. They agreed that cleaning up the mess could wait till morning.

Natsu was lying on his side facing Gray with his eyes already closed. He knew that he should just roll over and try to sleep but Gray just couldn't help but examine the dragon slayer's sleeping face. With alcohol lowering his inhibitions, he ignored the sensible part of his brain screaming at him to stop and leaned forwards and connected his lips with Natsu's.

It was only a few seconds before hands pressed against his chest and shoved him away.

"What the hell Gray?" Natsu shouted at him. However, Gray simply chose to close his eyes and was out in a matter of minutes.

Now he had a killer headache and plagued with how disgusted Natsu probably was with him, he couldn't even look in his teammate's direction. Even worse, Natsu hadn't said one word to him aside from the fact that Lucy would be back from her mission at twelve. Knowing that the other was avoiding talking to him only made him feel guiltier. But dammit he couldn't even see if the stove was getting clean! They couldn't keep this silence up forever, right?

"Hey Natsu," he said with a steady voice. When he heard the dragon slayer turn off the running water he took it as a good sign.

"Do you think you could light up the inside of this thing? I can't tell if I got it all or not."

Natsu didn't answer but he did shuffle over to where Gray was leaning into the oven and knelt beside him. The ice maker mage scooted over enough for Natsu to slip an arm into the exterior of the appliance and set his fist ablaze.

Pleased at the illuminated view, Gray quickly scrubbed at a few places he'd missed before nodding to himself at its cleanliness and sitting back on his heels.

"I think it's good, thanks."

When Gray turned over to look at Natsu to suggest that they finish up whatever was left in the sink he realized that the dragon slayer had also sat back and was leaning dangerously close to his face.

Gray froze and felt his face go red at the intensity that Natsu was examining him. He felt like those olive squinty eyes were staring into his soul.

"Uhh N-Natsu?"

"Gray, what's the last thing you remember doing yesterday?"

God was he really going to make him say it? Gray tried his best not to look nervous as he swiftly made up this mind.

"Well after we burned the crap out of the brownies we went to bed."

"And that's the last thing you remember?" Natsu accused.

"Yes."

Then Natsu was on the other side of the room before he could even blink. Gray stared after him in confusion as the dragon slayer shoved his hands back into the sink and began scrubbing vigorously once more. Somewhat confused at the other's strange behavior, Gray pushed himself up to his feet and joined Natsu by the sink.

The brownie pan was spotless and air drying on the counter so Natsu should've only had the wire racks left. However, they looked pretty clean beneath the pink haired teen's hands in the soapy water. Gray wasn't sure how to feel about the distant look in Natsu's eyes.

"I think those are good. Here I'll dry them off and put them back in the oven."

Natsu didn't say anything as he pulled them out of the water and heated them with his hands. Gray watched as the racks steamed and stepped aside for the dragon slayer to put them in the stove himself. After Natsu shut the door to the oven he didn't even look back as he starting walking out of Lucy's kitchen.

But Gray wasn't going to let him go so easily. He grabbed Natsu's arm before he could escape.

"What's up? You're acting weird."

Natsu pulled against his grip till Gray let go but stayed put. He turned to frown at his teammate and crossed his arms over his stomach.

"Nothing's up and you're the weird one!"

"What are you talking about?"

"You-" Natsu cut off and glared at the floor. "Just forget it," he mumbled as he went to leave again.

Gray took a deep breath as he prepared himself for even more awkwardness but he knew that he couldn't leave things as they were. Just because Natsu thought he forgot about the kiss doesn't mean either of them didn't remember it happening.

"Wait, is…is this about the…kiss?" Gray closed his eyes as he braced for impact.

Natsu whirled around. "You remember?!"

"I do," Gray admitted, "And I'm sorry, I just-mmph!"

Warm lips smashed against his as Natsu wrapped his arms around his back. After the initial shock wore off, Gray closed his eyes and kissed the dragon slayer back. Figuring it was too good to be true, Gray decided to enjoy it while it lasted. Kissing Natsu was everything that he'd dreamed about. When that hot tongue wiggled its way into his mouth, he felt like Natsu was trying to suck the fire out of him. But it was over sooner than he'd hoped and the flame brain pulled away with a face redder than a tomato.

"Was that okay?" he asked nervously.

"Hell yeah! You have no idea how long I've wanted to do that!" said Gray.

Natsu smiled and Gray smirked as he grabbed the dragon slayer's shirt and pulled him back in for another kiss.

Lucy was exhausted from another long mission as she opened the door to her apartment. Kicking off her shoes and tossing her bag aside she headed to her kitchen for a tall glass of something refreshing. Walking through the doorway the nearly screamed when she saw her two teammates making out on her floor.

It was safe to say that they were banned from visiting for a while.

L7L7L7L7

And that's all. This story was a personal challenge for me to sit down and write something in one sitting so it's a little rough but I might edit it a bit later. Please let me know what you think (:


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